The same week that Microsoft issued a press release providing further details about some of the technological advances that will result from the November 2006 technology agreement between Novell and Microsoft, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told Wall Street what he really thinks the deal means to Microsoft. During a forecast update meeting for financial analysts and shareholders on February 15, Ballmer reiterated that, to him, the deal is more about Microsoft exerting intellectual property pressure on Novell than anything else.

True and I don't think the rest of the world will fall for MS patents, as it amounts to little more, than a lets all pay Microsoft tax. Possibly the sooner MS brings on some patent claims in the US the sooner the rest of the world will say no, maybe Ballmer knows this and figures FUD is less risky

Not quite. If you write some code that automatically generates Top 40 pop-hits and copyright it, I can do the same thing, as long as I write my own code and don't plagiarize yours. But if you patent the idea, then no one else is allowed to implement it, regardless of how they do it, or the code they use.